FORESTRY | 2014-04-09 04:19:25 |
Chapter II: Water*****FAST***** (3) SeaSprite: What other cost 2 creature has 5 attack?.... it shortens the game for the opponent because of the pressure it exerts upon him - but it also shortens the game for yourself, because SeaSprite demands 2 of your Life as sacrifice each turn. IceGolem: it might have crappy presence value in absolute terms, but its function is strictly agressive (yes, i know, "Golem can block Unicorn in a destruct anti-timing". Shut up.) for use in the context of destruct play or being agressive while under fire from sweeps. Overlord: great stats and the ability to facilitate flankings, doesnt get faster than that (other than Priestess, but thats for a different moment)... compare to W10, it has 3 less HP and upon summoning it already has 7 attack, so yeah. *****CONTEXTUAL***** (4) Apostate: its presence value is good, but it only has 3 attack... its main purpose is transforming Water to Fire... so its a mana converter but creates presence, and the mana shift is towards Fire, which is a very fast house - so everything averages out to contextual speed, can be slow or fast. Elder: It is a generator, yes, but on its own it can even kill a Golem if it gets the 1st hit, it is hard to clear out efficiently... also, consider what so much Air power can potentially be used for? It could be used defensively for A4s and A10, but it can also be used for A2s, A3s, A5s, A6s, A8s, 11, 12... so yeah, it might be a generator but its presence power and uses make it ambiguous. Turtle: One of the most maliciously annoying creatures ever and for good reason. One cannot absolutely tell if its used for an early game fast timing with something like Bargul or a transition for a very long game with MasterHealer supporting it FOREVER. Anyhow, for its price, 5 attack is kind of a sad sight, but it can make a difference in fast timings... and in the long term it adds up after a while since it wont be cleared out. MindMaster: crappy durability for its price, but it has 6 attack, thats some pressure, coupled with an ability that generates mana and suited for longer games, it is a hybrid that can go either fast or slow. *****SLOW***** (5) Meditations: Quite simply, it does not generate presence, nor damage opponent nor creatures... it generates mana, slow as hell in itself. IceGuard: i think i had a heated debate with Atoms over this one. I considered it "ambiguous" because against A3 or A6 it gives to possiblity to generate presence instead of wasting a turn healing, creating pressure on the opponent... on the other hand, qualitatively speaking, its ability is all about reducing incoming damage and switching the game from a possible kill with direct damage to forcing the opponent to engage in terms of presence, which is way slower and aims for longer games. AcidRain: its debatable, but... it does two things, destruct and mana sabotage... what i can say is that it favours vertical presence (which usually favours longer games) and it also gives the user a mana advantage, given that its used properly (which again, is a late game strategy focus). Its definitely not fast though, but it could be ambiguous category. WaterEle: It never comes as fast as F10 because only things like Intervention can make it do so... also, its effect is slow/defensive, making it a very slow creature suited for long games. AstralGuard: its presence value is null with its 1 attack and it shuts down the opponents mana generation... either the opponent is ground down to a halt, or it kills the player that used it because it tried to slow down the game while it couldnt realistically could. *****Summary***** Not a fast house... arguably the hardest one to use also, because one third of it is difficult to tell when to use properly and another third only suited for slow and longer games. Modified by FORESTRY on 2014-04-11 05:29:45 Wavelength | 2014-04-10 02:43:45 |
As of this writing you seem to have missed Acidic Rain. Which I'm assuming falls into the "slow" category?
I also personally agree with... Atoms, I assume, but whoever said that Ice Guard should be "slow". Its purpose is to make sure that the game drags on long enough so that you can either heal back out of the danger zone or get a kill (that you would have gotten anyway) without dying first. It's rarely used "instead" of a heal; if the player can do one or the other, it's very likely they're going to do both unless they really need that Water/Earth mana.
JimmyHoffa | 2014-04-10 06:46:25 |
Interesting topic forestry. Defintely agree with everything you said, especially golem.
Sorry wavelength, but I think you are way off base about ice guard. No worries.. when I started out, the first game or two, I made the same incorrect assumption.
Even though my life is unbelievable hard, I will try to be more nice to people in future, especially when they have over 2 x my level (19+), since their overall game-experience is probably higher than mine!
Since Godmother can not care for me all the time, I know, that she will delete further insulting or stupid messages of me to protect me from myself and God... Modified by StephanieF on 2014-04-10 11:20:00 FORESTRY | 2014-04-10 07:11:18 |
As of this writing you seem to have missed Acidic Rain. Which I'm assuming falls into the "slow" category?
I also personally agree with... Atoms, I assume, but whoever said that Ice Guard should be "slow". Its purpose is to make sure that the game drags on long enough so that you can either heal back out of the danger zone or get a kill (that you would have gotten anyway) without dying first. It's rarely used "instead" of a heal; if the player can do one or the other, it's very likely they're going to do both unless they really need that Water/Earth mana. Atoms argues that turtle is also slow, but it has 5 attack and its role is presence superiority vs lower tiers... but against elementals its a staller, so i still think is hybrid...
I did not classify spells other than direct damage and heals.
for example f6: is fast or slow?... is neither - kills creature either for slot breaks, but it can be used to defend oneself... e9? clears out rushes, but it throws away many slow down tools and opens window of opportunity to kill opponent with say, overlord and air... (edit: i mean in context of f7 and e3 vs e9)
Modified by FORESTRY on 2014-04-10 07:17:07 Wavelength | 2014-04-10 18:12:20 |
... Atoms argues that turtle is also slow, but it has 5 attack and its role is presence superiority vs lower tiers... but against elementals its a staller, so i still think is hybrid...
I did not classify spells other than direct damage and heals.
for example f6: is fast or slow?... is neither - kills creature either for slot breaks, but it can be used to defend oneself... e9? clears out rushes, but it throws away many slow down tools and opens window of opportunity to kill opponent with say, overlord and air... (edit: i mean in context of f7 and e3 vs e9) Ignoring Jimmy's ridiculous rant, I'll stay on topic...See, I'd actually call Turtle a "fast" card. It's a pure slot-presence play, like Titan, and you can often use it in the first few turns of the game. If you're not winning the other slots right now, Turtle is probably not your best move (sometimes it is, like in front of, ironically, Titan... but at this point you're likely screwed). I can absolutely see the argument for "contextual" but I really can't see the argument for "slow" on him. Wish you'd classify all the cards... Flame Wave is definitely a faster card, for instance, than Acidic Rain (which plays the mana game as part of its value) or Stone Rain (which is only a winning move if you yourself are playing the mana game, or already have an insane amount of vertical presence on the board). Chain Lightning is probably the "fastest" of all spells (save for pure direct damage like A6 and E6), and Inferno is more contextual since it's best used as a counter to important creatures rather than a pure way to break slots. All my thoughts and not necessarily yours nor anyone else's, but I think they're worth discussing nonetheless. =)
FORESTRY | 2014-04-10 19:09:27 |
... Ignoring Jimmy's ridiculous rant, I'll stay on topic...
See, I'd actually call Turtle a "fast" card. It's a pure slot-presence play, like Titan, and you can often use it in the first few turns of the game. If you're not winning the other slots right now, Turtle is probably not your best move (sometimes it is, like in front of, ironically, Titan... but at this point you're likely screwed). I can absolutely see the argument for "contextual" but I really can't see the argument for "slow" on him.
Wish you'd classify all the cards... Flame Wave is definitely a faster card, for instance, than Acidic Rain (which plays the mana game as part of its value) or Stone Rain (which is only a winning move if you yourself are playing the mana game, or already have an insane amount of vertical presence on the board). Chain Lightning is probably the "fastest" of all spells (save for pure direct damage like A6 and E6), and Inferno is more contextual since it's best used as a counter to important creatures rather than a pure way to break slots.
All my thoughts and not necessarily yours nor anyone else's, but I think they're worth discussing nonetheless. =)
Yeah, thats very true, turtle is a play for presence... but again, thinking about synergy with E11 its the perfect staller... maybe im not following my initial criterions 100%, because to a certain point i think about cost and synergy at some points - but so far the only controversial cards are W6 and W7. The reason why i dont do pure sweeps or destructs that dont do direct damage is for one reason, and an important one... one of the principles of this series is about "Will this prolong or shorten the game?", and F6 can go both ways, it can shorten the game by breaking slots... or it can lenghten the game by defending from horizontal. Your case for W8 being useful for long games is a strong one, since it sabotages enemy mana which gives an advantage if the user has vertical (which usually slants to slow) and the opponent is horizontalling early on. I dont agree with E9 being slow per se... you kill your opponents rushing creatures (thus, you slow him down), but as i said, you lose your slow/long-term possibilities by throwing away your Earth... elaborating on the F7+E3 vs E9 example, thats why using E9 against it is bad and is much preferable to use F11 to defend against it, because F7+E3 WILL do damage by the time E9 comes, which will only equalize mana expenditure on both sides but the E9er will not only have taken damage, but will be even in terms of expenditure while the opponent only used Fire and Earth to do damage, E9er will be on the defensive now because lower health, and the F7er will just finish the job with Water and Air... E9 prolongs the game for the caster because it kills the 1st wave of the rush, but then he will have no way to react to the 2nd wave; end result? a shorter game. So my premise is that every single spell can be debated about its use, say BloodRitual... is it fast or slow? Its neither, its conextual, it can be used offensively and defensively.... but Death7 could be said to intrinsically be slow (while Rage is hybrid)... Eh, alright, maybe ill include sweeps, but dont be surprised if most of them are contextual.
JimmyHoffa | 2014-04-11 03:18:03 |
I... Ignoring Jimmy's ridiculous rant, I'll stay on topic..
Lol... thanks a lot wave. Surprised you didn't call me Earth 8 again.... which would be totally cool with me since he got the extra life point. Btw... genius can't be ignored forever.
AtomOfUniverse | 2014-04-11 09:43:54 |
There are many aspects people can consider while trying to classify cards in terms of speed.
Stats, cost, ability, usage, influence on the game length.
In practice I usually use term of speed differently than Forestry (but he understands me well). Because he created a definition at the beggining of the fire post - which is only appropriate - I decided to follow it while helping in classifying units for the needs of these articles (the definition of speed term I normally use is so simplistic it wouldn't be worth an article, it's mostly based on mana cost).
In the end nobody should quarell about the definition of words. They have the meaning we gave them. Our "speeds" are just some different words, used for different aspects of the game.
I can see that Wave also considers usage of the card, which we both with Forestry probably don't - at this time.
My standing is that everybody should use the definition Forestry created for the purpose of this article rather than using their own - OR - debate about the definition itself. Not in the matter of being correct or not (because no word definition is incorrect) or rather on usefullness for the needs of these articles and in practice.
However... ;) ...just this time, I will try to precise what a think about the turtle in all aspects I can think of.
Stats (stats for the cost rather than stats in general) - slow creature Cost - moderately fast creature (again, here I treat higher cost being faster in unleashing your power) Ability - moderately slow creature (efficient and annoying, but rather slow) Usage - correct usage is usually moderately fast (if not W7 with E11), wrong usage is usually slow (sorry, but I practically never consider blocking an elemental with turtle as correct play) Influence on the game length - correct usage can slightly shorten the game or make it last longer, wrong usage makes it last _much_ longer.
(again, I treat usage not as the same category as affecting the game length - usage that makes serious changes on the board while lengthening the game I may still consider as fast) Modified by AtomOfUniverse on 2014-04-11 10:10:11 srbhkshk | 2014-04-11 12:19:37 |
I don't think a guy that costs 7(water at that!!) and has 5 attack is fast in any way whatsoever.
Valentyne | 2014-04-11 17:52:07 |
As a standalone card, Giant Turtle is a slower, defense oriented card, for the most part. What can make it faster is its great synergies; namely Goblin Berserker, Bargul, and stuff like Call to Ancient Spirits - faster cards. With these little helpers, Giant Turtle can lend itself to a faster game. But by itself it is rather slowish. It's slow because it's hard to kill, therefore the opponent cannot break through to get at the player behind the turtle. So I think contextual kinda suits it.
FORESTRY | 2014-04-11 22:31:34 |
I don't think a guy that costs 7(water at that!!) and has 5 attack is fast in any way whatsoever. "Fast speed: shortens the game; threatens opponent directly, either by board presence or direct damage." "Contextual speed: Can shorten or prolong the game depending on its usage." "Slow speed: lenghtens the game; threatens opponent indirectly by generation of life or mana."
Turtle's value revolves around its 5 armor ability, which is good against anything with 7 or less attack, because it will kill them with little or no damage to itself and still pose a threat... it stats losing its utility at 8 or 9 attack, because it dies in either 6 or 4 turns... scale it up to 11 attack and it lives for 3 turns... scale up to 13 (GB output, or some elemental) and it only lives 2 turns, the same as E3 or W2... So as I have just demonstrated, the earlier it arrives, and the lower the tier that creatures that engage it, the more efficient it is at pressuring the opponent in a single slot... and when higher tier creatures with high attack arrive, it loses some of its utility, not just because a high attack creature will engage it, but since the higher tier unit will have VerticalPresence, the opponent will gladly use some type of Destruct to assist in its clearance. Turtle is only well suited for long games if it has support of E11 and theres no Destruct happening, but those are 2 big IFS... it does not generate life, it does not generate mana, it generates a very special kind of board presence and pressure.
srbhkshk | 2014-04-12 00:00:15 |
That's pretty much the point, even if it's unblocked it doesn't really pose any real threat, sure it will almost always kill whatever is in front of it but after that, nothing much.
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